Eternal Vigil
by Kalshion
Summary: AU Two months have now passed since the Book of Darkness incident, but Nanoha and Fate's currently peaceful lives won't be so peaceful after a strange girl arrives... 'Chapter 1 finally up after SO long!
1. Prologue

**Author Note: Special thanks to Myna5194 for proofreading.**

"See you tomorrow at school!" Suzuka waved to her friends as she strolled up the walkway leading to her lavous home. She took one last look as the limo drove away then with a smile she walked through the doors and greeted her two maids. "Welcome home, Ojo-sama," the two maids said respectfully.

"Good evening," Suzuka smiled.

"How was school?" Shinobu, her older sister, inquired as she walked into the living room.

"It was ok," Suzuka said and took a seat on the couch. She let out a sigh and looked at her school bag, then smiled slightly. "I'll be in my room," she said and quickly grabbed her bag and ran up to her room.

Shinobu smiled and went to another part of the house. As she was getting ready to do some cleaning, the house began to shake violently. A rumbling sound could be heard in the distance, and it suddenly sparked Suzuka's curiosity.

The sky crackled with energy, dark, ominous clouds formed and lightning arced out in several directions. The rumbling resembled the sound of thunder more than what it really was: explosions.

The winds began to pick up, tree's swayed and branches, already weak from a previous wind storm, snapped and accompanied the breeze on its journey through the city. Through normal eyes, no one would notice, but through the eyes of someone capable of using magic, they'd have seen a small bright object suddenly shoot out of the center of the storm.

It flew through the air, on a course for a distant area of the city; it slammed into several trees with enough speed and power to cause a few of them to burst, almost as if they had been struck by lightning. When the object finally hit the ground, it caused a small crater to form around it, with small fires that licked the outer edge.

A shining light illuminated the crater for several seconds, before the object took the form of a little human girl, roughly nine years of age. The girl breathed heavily, her body bruised and bloodied, and her arm was twisted into an unnatural position.

She held a sword in one hand, and her clothing was torn to the point where it was impossible to fix. "Ughs.. must.. get out.. of.. here.." she muttered and stared up at the sky, and suddenly, rain drops began to pelt her face, causing her to blink a few times. She struggled to get up and found her legs burning with pain.

The ground was slippery, and thus caused her to fall onto her chest, resulting in a yelp of pain. She made an effort to look at the wound on her chest, and she found a large cut that was clearly deep. Her face burned with excruciating pain. She snapped her attention back to getting under some cover from the storm.

Managing to stand back up, she limped forward and fell onto her knees near a large tree that could easily be used for shelter. She rested her back up against it and she looked down at her broken arm and grabbed it. Then with a determined look, she twisted it back into place. A gut wrenching scream pierced the heavy rain fall and caused an echo to occur in the distance.

She whimpered at the pain that coursed through her arm. "Go…" she struggled and coughed and blood splattered onto the ground, which quickly went away due to the rain water.

As she lay against the tree, she felt her body becoming cold and also began to feel numbness in her legs. "S.. so… th… this is… h… how… I-I-I-I.. g… go…" she muttered and closed her eyes. She began to notice her hearing fading, the sound of the rain dissipating in the distance. Feeling in her arms left her; finally she could no longer see the light behind her closed eyes.


	2. Recovery P1

**_Note: This was only partially proof-read, due to my PR being very busy with school and life, so there are most likely misspelling that I have missed during my own readings - please do not blame the BR =) _**

A siren pierced her ears; she felt her body continuously shaking and also heard two other people near her saying stuff that she didn't understand. Then, just as suddenly she felt her motion stop briefly. _Where… am I? _She thought to herself and then felt herself drop suddenly then go into motion again.

"I need twenty one liters of-"

"IV line here!"

The sounds of people speaking and shouting brought her out of her rest and she suddenly felt something pierce her skin. She tried to let out a painful yelp, but the command from her brain to her vocal cords never arrived and thus she was silent. She tried to open her eyes and managed to get a blurry vision.

Walls ran by her, a woman's reassuring smile over her own. She felt something over her mouth and nose, and noticed the woman was doing something just below her chin. Fresh, cool air was being pushed into her mouth and down her lungs, she also felt an odd sensation in her arm as it began to go numb – this same numbness began to creep up her legs.

"What… is going on…" she managed to say but in a very low, almost inaudible tone. The woman who was over her looked somewhat startled to hear her speak but then smiled and said that she would be fine.

A small thankful smile creased her pain stricken face as she stared up at the woman. Then all of a sudden a violent pain spiked through her body. She felt it along her arms and legs, and also within her chest, she let out an agonizing scream and tried to ignore it, but it was useless. The suffering continued and grew ever worse.

"More morphine!" she heard the woman shout and was handed a syringe. Seconds later, the girl began to see dots in her vision, which was quickly reduced to nothing but blackness as she drifted to sleep. The woman let out a smile when the girl stopped screaming and then gestured for the doctor to continue.

**5 hours later**

Hour's passed; it was early morning when the same woman who had comforted her walked out of the surgery room and towards a nurse's station. "Take her to the sixth floor, room 209,"

"Intensive care unit, ma'am?"

The woman gave a stressful sigh and said, "Yes, it'll be awhile before she'll be awake, perhaps days," she then grabbed her bag and took one last look as two other nurse's wheeled a gurney out of the surgery room.

With a long look the nurse watched the women leave and then got up from her station and walked over to her companions.

"Sixth floor," she said and the other two nodded. They wheeled the gurney into the elevator and punched the button for the sixth floor.

"Son of a bitch…" one of the three nurses said and looked down at the little girl. "What happened to get her into such a condition?"

"I don't know," the other, a somewhat taller nurse, said. "It was rather ugly last night. So perhaps she got caught in the storm?"

"I doubt it," said the head nurse. "Her condition is far too serious, plus you saw those burns on her body and those cuts and bruises… obviously child abuse."

"Damn…" a blonde holding the rails on the gurney said and bore an angry face. "I hope they catch the bastards."

A chime indicated that they had reached the sixth floor. The doors parted and they wheeled the gurney out and toward the assigned room a young, black haired nurse joined them from the nurse's station and opened the door and set the girls gurney up against the window, attaching monitors to her and making sure she was comfortable.

"Now.. the waiting game," the head nurse said from the entry way.

**10 hours later**

She smiled as she checked the girl's dressings. "Good," said the black haired nurse and returned to her station. It was just a quarter past nine, and the electrical storm that was raging outside minutes before had been replaced by a windy one with little rain.

The nurse glanced at ten other monitors, all of which showed stable heart readings, lungs were excellent and blood pressures were fine. With a satisfying smile, she brought her feet up onto the table and opened a small book she had brought. The title was 'Murders She Wrote' and she opened the book and smiled at her current location in the text.

Her peaceful state of mind was abruptly cut short and was soon bombarded with alerts. A monitor suddenly displayed a warning as the numbers that had been in green went red; the monitor in question was for the young girl who had been issued it fifteen hours ago.

"Shit!" The nurse shouted in panic, punched a button and then picked up the phone and dialed a number. "Doctor Melan to intensive care unit five! Patient 209 is crashing!" which was all she had time to say before hanging up and running from around her station and into the room; seconds later she was joined by four other nurses and the doctor she had called.

"Heart rate is dropping!"

"Blood pressure is peeking!

"We are losing her!"

"She's going into cardiac arrest!"

Nurses scrambled to collect the necessary tools, the doctor took two pads, dabbed a gel on them and began quickly rubbing them together to create friction. A whine drowned out the nurses' chatter as a machine came to life. "Clear!"

"Clear!" the doctor shouted and pressed the pads on the girl's chest. A shock went through the pads and into her body, she lifted off the bed for a second and then back down. Her heart monitor went dead for a micro-second before going back to being stable.

He sighed and handed the pads to the nurse. "That was too close," he said exhaustingly and examined the two IV and blood packs that he had connected to her. He found everything to be in order and sighed exasperatedly.

**19 Hours later**

"So, how is out little patient?" a nurse wearing civilian clothing said as she walked up to the nurses' station. The nurse looked over at the monitors and smiled. "Seems she's rather stable,"

"She is," the nurse behind the station said and got up. "She almost died though a few hours ago, her heart had stopped for several seconds but we managed to refiballate it," she shook her head and looked toward the room that the girl they were talking about was in. "It seems though that she is healing quite well, the bruises that I had seen on her face when she was brought in are apparently going away,"

"Are they now?" the other nurse said and put her things down and walked into the girl's room. She smiled when she saw that sure enough the bruises were fading. "That's good," she smiled reassuringly and looked at the IV and blood packs and realized that the IV pack needed changing. "Say, how much blood did she lose again?"

"She is labeled as a Class IV on the hemorrhage table, so above forty percent of her normal blood volume or to be exact, roughly one point one one seven liters of blood if not more. Sadly we really can't get a very accurate number since the place she was found has been contaminated by the weather we had last night," the nurse said and got up from the station and brought the clipboard with her.

She flipped the pages and looked at the list of injuries. "She has internal bleeding which the surgeons have been able to 'somewhat' fix, but she'll be going back into surgery later," she said and flipped to another page. "She also had several severe lacerations on her body, the doctor said it looked like several took a knife and, in his own words 'treated her like a cutting board with meat on it'"

The nurse grimaced and sighed regretfully. "Poor thing, to be treated so harshly at such a young age, what else did they find?"

"Well, the rest of the pages detail her other injuries, had a broken shoulder but it seems she must've done 'something' but there was evidence that it had been popped back into place," the nurse said and had a sickening feeling go through her. "Ughs… I wonder how _that _felt."

"Probably rather painful," her companion said and drew a curtain around the bed to give the girl some privacy. "Either way, it'll be days before she-" the nurse said before turning and seeing another young girl at the door.

The girl would a sailor school dress and had a small pitcher with some flowers in it. "Ummm," the girl looked at the two nurses but found that she had a lump in her throat. Behind her another girl though older than her spoke up for her, "a young girl roughly my little sister's age was brought in almost a day ago, is this where she is?"

"This is, are you family?" the nurse in civilian clothing asked.

The teenager shook her head. "No, but my little sister is rather worried about the girl so I brought her here, may we?"

"Sure, I don't see any problems with that," the nurse said and was about to draw back the curtain. "Don't freak though when you see her condition ok?" the nurse said.

The nine year old girl nodded and braced herself. When the curtain was drawn back she saw the various IV lines that feed into her arms, along with two other lines from a blood pack on either arm. She also saw the wiring that connected the monitor and that was attached to her chest via small sticky pads. With a gulp the girl stepped toward and placed pitcher on the table. "I… hope you get better," she said softly before running out of the room.

"Thank you," the girl's older sister said, bowed and left the room.

The nurse's looked at one another and smiled before turning toward the girl, they noticed something strange then as a very faint almost invisible green film covered her body, but when the two rubbed their eyes took another look the film was gone. "Ughs, I must be tired," the other nurse said and walked out of the room. The civilian dressed one shook her head and decided to leave and get coffee.

**Four days later**

"I see she's doing better," the head nurse said as she walked into room 209.

Another nurse who was changing the girls dressings nodded. "She's no longer at risk of dieing thanks to the blood transfusions that we got from some of our patiants. I don't know why, but when we ran out of her blood type two days ago and word got around, almost everyone wanted to help out," she smiled and placed a sticky patch on the dressing to keep it in place.

"When will she be transferred to the children's hospital?" the same nurse asked after changing out the girls IV pack.

The head nurse looked at the schedule. "A few hour's from now, however you and Marsha will be going since you know her condition better than the nurses there," she smiled.

"Thank you ma'am," said the nurse as she took a seat and looked at several get well cards that were on the table.

"Who brought those in?" the head nurse asked in regards to the cards.

"Remember that nine year old girl a few days ago who brought in this pitcher?" the nurse asked and tapped the pitcher. The flowers inside had begun to blown, beside it were two other pitchers, small than the first but had the same type of flower. "Well, she's been bringing in these cards since then and from what I've noticed they were apparently written by either her or her classmates, my guess is her classmates."

"Are you saying she attended school there?" The head nurse asked but the nurse shook her head and smiled.

"I doubt it, in fact, I bet that girl doesn't even know her. It's just proof that she and her classmates are truly compassionate about others," a gentle smile creased the nurse's face. She placed a hand on the young girl's cheek and for a second she stirred, getting the nurses attention, but then she feel silent once again.

The head nurse smiled and turned toward the door. "Get her ready to be moved ok?" she said and left the room. With a nod the nurse got up from her chair and began to pack some of the things the girl had been given.

Hours later the nurse and her fellow companion were in an ambulance heading to a children's hospital just a few miles away. Marsha, one of the nurse's who was tasked with keeping track of the girls condition, watched the girl was concerned eyes. "She did wake up then?" she asked her companion.

"It was very brief, only a few seconds, but yes she did. So she is responding to touch which is a good thing but that was only brief, it'll still be awhile before she wakes up completely," the nurse said and looked at the girl and smiled compassionately. "I hope when she does though that we can find her a good family, because according to my husband, no one has filed a missing children's report or even come forth to claim she is there own,"

Marsha sighed sadly and shook head before saying. "That's sad, that someone would hurt such an innocent soul like this,"

"It happens, more times than we even know," her companion said. With that the two were silent.

**Two days later**

The nurse watched with a satisfying smile on her face. Her eyes were focused on the girl who had brought in flowers days before, but was now sitting in a chair beside a hospital bed reading a book. "It's pleasant isn't it?" Marsha said from behind her companion, whom nodded in return.

"It is, they don't even know each other and yet she is here reading a story to her. I wonder why?" her companion asked but Marsha just shrugged in shoulders in a 'I don't know' fashion and went over to the station.

With a smile her companion walked into the room and checked the IV lines, all the while the girl reading the book never looked up until just before the nurse left. "How is she?" the girl asked.

The nurse looked at her and said. "She's doing very well, hopefully she'll wake up in a few days, if not sooner," she said and left the room.

"I hope so," the girl said and went back to reading.

This went on for several hours before she was done with her book. "Suzuka?" another girl her age said from the doorway.

Suzuka turned toward the voice and smiled. "Hey Nanoha," she said and got up, placing the book on the multicolored chair. "I.. apologize for not being at school," she said in an apologetic tone.

"Eh?" Nanoha blinked and smiled. "It's alright, we all know that you've been very concerned for her,"

"It's just that seeing her like this… conjure ups memories of what happened to you last month," Suzuka said in a low, sad tone.

Nanoha smiled and embraced her friend. "It's alright, I lived through it and understood why it happened and I promise I won't do that again ok?" she said and her friend pushed off and nodded.

"Thank you Nanoha.. um… how was school?" Suzuka asked with a gentle smile.

She shook her head and grabbed another chair and sat down, with Suzuka removing the book from her own chair and sitting. "It was ok, I have some more cards from our classmates," Nanoha said and opened her school bag and took out a stack of cards.

Suzuka smiled reassuringly and placed the stack on the bed. "When she wakes up, she'll probably wonder who all these kids are who are wishing her to get better," she said and looked down at the floor. "Though the doctor did say that she'll need help getting back on her feet, want to help out?"

"Sure, I can also ask Lindy if she can spare Amy.. since Amy helped me last month when I was hospitalized," said Nanoha. She looked at the girl and smiled gently before getting up. "Go ahead, my big brother is here with me, Arisa says you have piano practice right?"

"Ah!.. that's right, I'd been so concerned for her that I've been putting it off, I.. better go," Suzuka said and then thanked her friend and left. Nanoha waved good bye and took Suzuka's seat and looked at the book in question.

With another smile she got up and placed the book back into a small bag that Suzuka had brought with her earlier that day. She then took out another book and walked back over to her seat and sat down, then started reading.

During this entire time, the nurse had been watching with a satisfied smile. "I wouldn't mind if one of those girls families adopted her if it becomes the case that her family doesn't come," she said to herself and then went to her station.

**Four days later, late night.**

Wind patted against the window; outside hail was dropping due to the coldness of the weather. In her room, the girl still slept peacefully but then suddenly her hands switched and her fingers started moving. Marsha, who had been watering the flowers in the pitcher suddenly, noticed the movement. "Ah!" she smiled and ran out of the room.

Her eyes fluttered open and she looked up at the ceiling; she blinked, closing her eyes slowly and opening them again. She turned her head to one side and saw a table with three pitchers, one large and two smaller, all three had flowers in them; she also saw a stack of cards. She then turned her head in the other direction and saw wires leading out from under the sheets and up to a long bar on the wall. She was silent was she attempted to sit up but found that her body wasn't readily responding to her commands, this seemed to have shocked her for a moment before she was finally able to sit up. The room was bathed in several different colors and had various pictures on the wall, reminiscent of cats, dogs, and other wildlife. When she looked at herself she realized she was wearing a light red gown that covered her frame, a sailor collar, along with the way the room appeared, told her that she was in a children's hospitals.

She turned toward the window and saw the weather outside; and then became startled when she felt some eyes on her back and turned her head toward the door. Standing the doorway was a nurse and a doctor; the doctor smiled gently at her and walked over. "How are you feeling little one?" he asked her.

The girl cocked her head questioningly at his statement and looked at him oddly. The doctor seemed startled by this and asked again, but got the same, silent response.

_This is odd… I didn't know there were any humans still alive… unless this is a trap to make me reveal who I am, in that case I better act like I don't know who, or even what I am…_ she thought and looked back at the doctor and the nurse.

"She must have amnesia or something," a nurse said she held up some fingers and asked her how many she was holding up. The girl looked very confused and couldn't answer the question; this only helped confirm that nurse's theory.

With a sigh the doctor nodded. "I see, well, we should've expected as much. Let's get her some food and something to drink ok?" he told a nurse who nodded and went off to get something for her to eat. With that the doctor and two other nurse's smiled and left the room.

The girl herself let out a nervous sigh and turned toward the window. "I.. wonder if I can lead a normal life…" she smiled gently to herself and laid down on her pillow. It was then that she felt how comfortable the clothing she was wearing felt, and a true, comfortable, smile crossed her face. _Though how long… _she thought before closing her eyes.

**Next day**

She was woken later that day by the sound of someone reading a book; she opened her eyes and looked to her left and saw a young girl sitting in a chair, it was the same type of chair she had seen when she was awake hours before.

She sat up and smiled at the girl; who apparently hadn't noticed her. It wasn't until she lowered the book and closed it, then looked up and blinked in surprise. "eh?" she said and then sighed as she contained her surprise, then looked up and smiled gently. "You're awake," she said and placed the book down by one of the beds legs.

Suzuka looked the girl over and inquired. "You like my story?"

The girl blinked and smiled. Suzuka nodded and recalled what the doctor had told her big sister just an hour before, that the girl had amnesia and most likely wouldn't know what she was talking about.

"_It will most likely be a few days before she starts remembering things, thankfully medical technology has progressed enough to where we'll be able to give her medical injections that'll slowly assist her in recover her memory. However, we won't know the full extent until later"_, the doctor had said.

"Do you know your name?" Suzuka asked and looked down at a small ID card that was in her lap. That card had been given to her by the nurse, along with some of the girl's personnel items that had been recovered from her during the transport to the hospital. When the girl didn't answer she picked up the ID card. The card looked like a student ID, but clearly wasn't a school ID, she then showed the card to the girl.

She looked over it with a puzzling expression. Suzuka placed a finger on a four letter word and spoke it. "Ri-ta" she said.

"Ra…Ra…Ra…Ra..ta?" the girl said but Suzuka shook her head.

"Rrrr-eee-taaaa" Suzuka said, sounding it out for her.

"Rrrr…eee…taaa…" the girl said and then looked at her. "Rita…" the girl smiled when she got the word correctly.

"That's your name," Suzuka said and spent the next minute and half couching Rita through her name and how to pronounce and say it.

"Suzuka," a nurse said and walked into the room. "I'm afraid you have to go, visiting hours are over," she said.

Suzuka sighed sadly and got up. "Ok, I'll talk to you tomorrow Rita ok? Then we can continue where we left off, take care!" she said and left the room. Rita smiled and watched the girl leave, and then turned the window. _Suzuka has never been touched by war.. I pray that remains_ she thought.

The nurse smiled gently and walked over to the bed. "You to, it's bed time ok?" she said. Rita nodded and laid down, pulling the sheets over her and closing her eyes. The nurse then turned off the lights and wished her a good night.

**Note: Not at great as I wanted it to be, but hopefully one my PR is off of school we can get back to proof-reading this chapter and then I'll reupload it. Though I do want to apologize for taking SO long to upload! =( **


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